Kusha Navodar (2:50)

To get into the conversation, help me welcome Food and Wine editor in chief, Hunter Lewis. Hunter, welcome to the show.

Hunter Lewis (2:58)

Hey there. Thanks for having me.

Kusha Navodar (2:59)

Absolutely. So what are some tips you can share when planning a food trip?

Hunter Lewis (3:05)

You know, I think the first thing you need to think about is don't. Don't fly by the seat of your pants. Plan early and do your research. You know, shameless plug. Go to foodandwine.com but you really need to get out there and look on social media, look on Instagram, and figure out what your anchor point is. Not just what town you're going, but what neighborhood do you want to be in. Pick a couple spots that you really want to go to, make reservations in advance if they take reservations, or understand what their policy is for waiting online, and build a Google map. This is something that my wife and I do. Wherever we go, we anchor that Google map with a couple spots and then we branch out from there. And, you know, we really want to get to know a neighborhood. And the best way to get to know that neighborhood is through that restaurant or through that farmer's market or through that, that anchor point that's going to be entry point into the food culture of that. That town or that city. Yeah.

Kusha Navodar (4:07)

You know, your point about going on Instagram or Twitter is an interesting one because I've had a hit or miss experience with that personally, where, you know, sometimes it feels like restaurants might just be Instagram worthy. You know what I mean? Is there a way to differentiate or is Instagram generally a good place to go, or are there other places that you recommend folks follow up with after they find a place that they're interested in?

Hunter Lewis (4:27)

Yeah, I mean, the way that we use Instagram for research day to day is anything that looks like a coffee drink or a pastry or an ice cream cone that is like, just like so ridiculously Instagram friendly. And it almost feels like Instagram bait. We stay away from, from those places, but the places, you know, after years of doing this, you kind of. You kind of develop the sixth sense and this divining rod. And that's not helpful to, to the lay listener here. But, you know, you can kind of suss out the places that feel legitimate and, you know, and then you ask around, you, you know, you follow. You check and see who that restaurant follows, who their farmers are. Are there other legitimate food people that follow them too? And you can kind of go down The Instagram rabbit hole to vet certain places. That's one way we do it.

Kusha Navodar (5:21)

That idea of who do they follow and who follows them, I think is very, very helpful. Something I haven't thought of before, at least. Hunter, we've got our first call. Let's go to Julian in Northville, New Jersey. Hey, Julian, welcome to the show.

Callers (5:34)

Thank you. Two observations. The first is I never tell anyone that this restaurant has the best food they will ever eat because usually based on that expectation, it is not. And my second observation is when I think back about my great restaurant experiences, they all involve the company I was with and what we did and what we talked about. Of course, the food was also excellent, but I've never had a memorable meal with people that I where I did not enjoy the company.

Kusha Navodar (6:13)

Julian, thank you so much for that call. I want to read out a text that we just got. It says sometimes the best food isn't super pricey. Taco Way beach, formerly Rockaway Taco, had the best taco I've ever had. It was a 40 minute drive. Hunter, when you're looking at places, how much do you consider price being correlated to quality?

Hunter Lewis (6:35)

All the time. All the time. But it's not. Price equals quality. You know, I think we all are searching for high, medium and low. You know, I think that there's a disconnect between price equal and quality. I mean, there's, you know, there are great pizza spots and slice joints in the city where you're not going to be paying, you know, more than, than $15 for a full meal. You know, I think that there are some taco spots in the city that don't get enough love and we should be actually paying more for that taco. But there's an expectation, because it's a taco, that it should be less than, you know, $5 a taco. So I wouldn't go down, that I wouldn't go through that trap of, of equating price to quality. But I think getting back to, you know, to the journey and the discovery and better understanding a neighborhood and that food culture, you know, think about that in a high, medium, low way. If you're going to be in a town for more than a couple nights, you know, check out the tacos, check out the pizza spots, check out the barbecue or the lobster rolls, but, but also do schedule a reservation and, and you know, think about fine dining or, or, you know, fine casual as a part of that journey too.

Kusha Navodar (7:46)

Yeah, and speaking of pizza, we got a caller here that I think has some opinions on that, let's go to Alan in Montclair. Hey, Alan, welcome to the show.

Callers (7:52)

Hey, thank you so much. So, yeah, first of all, road trips for food are the best. But I do want to just say, I think for pizza, you don't need to go to New Haven. You don't need to go to Chicago, which is really quiche, not pizza. But I gotta tell you, pizza suprema, I never would have thought. Right in the shadow of Madison Square Garden, 31st and 8th has the best, in my view, slices I've ever had. So there are some things that I just think any place in New York City, most pizzerias just blow out of the water. Anything else? But here's some other gems that I found along the way. There's a place on Long Beach Island, New Jersey, called the Holiday Snack Bar, which has, like, these homemade cakes and the best little hamburger you've ever had. And then Camden, Maine, for any roadside lobster stand.

Kusha Navodar (8:47)

Alan, thank you so much for those, those wonderful tips.

Hunter Lewis (8:50)

We gotta sign this guy up for a job, right?

Kusha Navodar (8:53)

Alan coming in with the hot takes and the delicious bites. Love that. Let's go to Chris in Manhattan. Hey, Chris, welcome to the show.

Callers (9:01)

Hi there. Yeah, I just want to say I took a trip to Acadia National Park. The camping there was great, but the lobster rolls were phenomenal. And, and, you know, first night we tried cooking for ourselves, and after that we're like, I just go eat out at the restaurant. Great time, great food. Highly recommend it.

Kusha Navodar (9:15)

Wonderful. Chris, thanks so much for that. And you mentioned lobster rolls. Hunter, let's go outside of Maryland a little bit. You've. Or let's go outside of New York, go to Maryland for a bit. You've highlighted Maryland for blue crab, which is a fairly easy drive and an even easier Amtrak trip. What's unique about blue crab and how does the taste differ from other kinds of crab?

Hunter Lewis (9:35)

Well, I think blue crab is synonymous with the east coast, with the Atlantic Ocean. The Maryland area used to be just completely a bounty of blue crab. Unfortunately, because of overfishing and for other issues, a lot of that blue crab is being brought up from the South East Atlantic and also from the Gulf. But there's great crab to be had all over Maryland. We love Bill's Terrace Inn in Essex, which is about a 20 minute drive from downtown Baltimore. Perfectly steamed crabs, very well seasoned. That's definitely one of the tops on our list. And of course, with all of these places, if we're talking about pizza, like you were mentioning earlier this week, steamed crab and in Maryland and Baltimore in particular, I mean, you're always going to create some kind of argument. And I think that the debate over the food is, is the best part about it.

Kusha Navodar (10:30)

What's your favorite way to eat blue crab?

Hunter Lewis (10:33)

I mean, you got to eat it with your hands. Once you crack it, you got to dig in. You got to. It's an investment of time. And best way to eat it is with a cold beer with your friends and family outside at a picnic table, preferably late in the day and getting your hands and your mouth dirty.

Kusha Navodar (10:50)

I love that. There's an interesting text that came through here that I'm going to read. It says state fairs, hitting the Minnesota State Fair, more specifically this year, always the best foods. Corn on the cob, fried fried bacon on the stick, cheese curds, onion rings, pronto pups. State fairs. My experience with state fairs, Hunter, generally is like the very large turkey leg that I get two bites out of. And I'm like, all right, that's. That's more than enough. Do you have any experience with finding great food at state fairs?

Hunter Lewis (11:16)

You know, I think about state fair food as stunt food. You know, it's the fried butter. It's the, hey, step right up and get your big Renaissance fair turkey leg that you mentioned. Not my favorite place to go for food, but for people watching. Absolutely.

Kusha Navodar (11:36)

Well, thank you so much for that text. Let's talk to Maggie in Oradel, New Jersey. Hey, Maggie, welcome to the show.

Callers (11:44)

Hi. Thank you so much. This is so exciting because yesterday I went to a new restaurant in Hoboken and it's called the Antique Bar and Bakery. And it's a little. It looks kind of like a funky old fashion bar, but it has a pizza oven of a hot fire pizza oven. But it has extraordinary dishes. One was an escargot with a tomatoey pesto sauce. That was fabulous. I've never had anything like it. And then they also had a baked cauliflower with cheese on top, roasted cauliflower with cheese on top. That was also wonderful. The flavors were marvelous. And then the final thing was that they had a bread pudding that comes out looking like a huge. I mean, it looks like it's enough for four people. And it had a caramel sauce, hot caramel sauce that you pour over it basically to die. So I highly recommend it. And Hoboken, New Jersey is a wonderful little town to wander around in, but this is a very special restaurant.

Kusha Navodar (12:48)

Maggie, thank you so much. And shout out to Hoboken all the food that you described tastes so good. I'm gonna. I imagine tastes so good. It sounds so good. I'm gonna read a couple more texts. One says, been my dream to do an oyster farm road trip all the way up to Nova Scotia from New York. I hope to do it someday soon. Here's another text. It says, anything to say about chance happenings? Sometimes I feel that my Google Maps list and Instagram accounts and editorials curate, but also limit possibility of stumble ins. My entire Google Maps is full of green dots from posts and articles I've read, but I have no understanding of what could possibly lie in between them. Then there's the restaurant fatigue that comes from all the recommendations, especially in New York City. What are your tips for discovering a good restaurant for yourself, Hunter? It's an interesting question. I'm sure you have some ideas behind.

Hunter Lewis (13:35)

Such a good question. Such a good question. I mean, I think we're all inundated with lists. You know, at Food and Wine, we. We make plenty of them, and we vet them, and when we say something's the best, we mean it. But, you know, I think that you can get so hung up with your Google map, you can get so hung up with the list, you can get so hung up with FOMO that you don't have your. You're not keeping your antenna up. And I think as travelers, I like to consider myself more of a traveler than tourist. You know, you're going into a place with your antenna up. You want to soak in that culture. You want to learn, you want to have fun, you want to spend time with friends and family. And so you got to keep that antenna up, and you have to ask questions, and you got to be curious. You know, one of the things I love to do when I go into a place for the first time is I like to go to the farmer's market, and I like to see who's there, and I like to see where the lines are and why there might be lines for a particular vendor. And I like to talk to those farmers and ask who's buying their produce and what restaurants they like to go to. And that's another way into the food culture of a city, too. So don't be afraid to ask around. I think the old way in the city was you ask your cabbie, and they knew where to go. But ask the farmers, Ask other chefs and restaurateurs, ask your server, where are they going? Ask your bartender. They'd love to tell you. Everybody's got an opinion in New York City.

Kusha Navodar (14:55)

Hunter. I want to talk about D.C. for a quick second, you mentioned that this area has really emerged as a culinary scene. What was the catalyst for that, you think?

Hunter Lewis (15:05)

Well, D.C. is a food city. It's a food city. On the rides. It doesn't get nearly enough love. I think Philly's certainly got some shine lately and well deserved. There's some great restaurants in Philadelphia, but Washington D.C. has an incredible culture. It's incredibly diverse. It's got all these different inputs and immigrants from all over the world. You know, I think you can't, you can't talk about a trip to D.C. without first talking about Ben's Chili Bowl. You know, it's been a go to spot for, for half smokes and half be half beef and half pork smoked sausage for decades. It's a, a place that's been central to the civil rights movement. Leaders and presidents and celebrities all go there and it's still going strong. And the Ali family is, is, they're, they're wonderful people. So first stop in D.C. has got to be Ben's Chili Bowl. But I'm really into the, the upstarts. I'm really into what food and wine best new chef Rob Rubba is doing over at Oyster Oyster. It's an incredible vegetarian focused restaurant where he's very focused on sustainability and eliminating food waste. I cannot wait to go to Pasquale, which is Isabel Costa's new restaurant with her partner Matt Conroy. Wood fired Mexican Fair. And we're featuring Isabel. And in the next issue of Food and Wine, she's also a food and wine best new chef. And there's a, a whole youth culture of, you know, of chefs who've come up in the city, who've cooked elsewhere, who found that it's easier to operate in Washington D.C. than maybe other major cities. And the level of cooking there right now is really, really high. And it's put on pause during the pandemic. But love the energy that that's pouring into D.C. right now.

Kusha Navodar (16:56)

We've got Olivia from Farmingdale, Long Island. Hey, Olivia. Welcome to the show.

Callers (17:02)

Hi.

Kusha Navodar (17:03)

Hi. So do you have a place that you're excited to go?

Callers (17:06)

Yes. So, place my mother actually introduced me to. There is a small chain of restaurants on Long Island. Three locations that I know of. Maybe there's more, I don't know. It's called the Shed. There's one in Huntington, one in Plainview and one in Sayville. And it's just standard American bistro food. But they do it, I think, better than anybody else on Long Island. And the price is Very reasonable. I would say it's the best calamari I've ever had on their appetizer menu. All of their burgers are great. Very comfortable environment. The staff is great. You can sit at the bar and order food and you feel very comfortable sitting there. I actually had a friend who I think worked for one of the chefs and said that he was a fantastic chef to work for, ran a very professional kitchen. And I guess it shows with the food that they're producing, because I will go to the shed any day of the week for a good meal.

Kusha Navodar (18:01)

Wonderful. Olivia, thank you so much for that call and for that shout out. It sounds like we have somebody who might be able to take us a little further away from the United States. Let's go to Jacob in East Harlem. Hey, Jacob, welcome to the show.

Callers (18:13)

Hi. Thanks for having me. Glad to be on. So, yeah. So I recently traveled to Copenhagen, and I feel like Copenhagen was a foodie's dream, just because every restaurant there had a, like a tasting menu that, you know, compared to New York, was very affordable. And they just, everything was so fresh and local. We went to this one spot called Barra de Busc, which was a veggie vegetarian restaurant. Though I highly recommend even those meat eaters that they check it out. It was like, incredible what they were able to do. And every time they bring over a plate, they described where it came from. They even talked about this old woman that they knew who does their foraging and gets all their greens and their spices. Everything was to die for.

Kusha Navodar (19:01)

Wonderful. Jacob, thank you so much. And thank you for introducing the international perspective there. Hunter. While I was listening to that, listening to Jacob, I was wondering, is there a place that you're excited to go next outside the United States for your next food adventure?

Hunter Lewis (19:15)

I cannot wait to get to Vietnam and Southeast Asia. The next trip I'm taking abroad is going to be down to Sicily and Mount Etna in particular. So very, very excited to learn more about the wines that are produced on this active volcano.

Kusha Navodar (19:34)

Oh, wonderful. And we're getting some more calls in about some places outside of the United States. Let's go to Nicole in Tarrytown. Hey, Nicole, welcome to the show.

Callers (19:44)

Oh, hi. Thank you so much. So about 15 years ago, I had the privilege of traveling Argentina with a group of high school students. And we took a one day trip to Uruguay from there. And I asked the cab driver, what should we eat? And I took my small group of kids to a restaurant to try Civitos, which is this bed of fries with a steak and then ham and cheese and two fried eggs on top. And it's surrounded by a lot of really delicious side, like maybe pickled cabbage or. I don't really remember the size as much, but it was so huge I had to definitely split that with someone else. I highly recommend trying it. I've never had it ever since then, but I'll always remember it.

Kusha Navodar (20:31)

Wonderful, Nicole, thank you so much. And I want to see if we can sneak in Rayon from Manhattan. Rayon, hi. I hope I'm pronouncing your name correctly. Welcome to the show.

Callers (20:39)

Hi. Yes, you are. Thank you for taking my call. So just listening to the conversation. I've had a lot of, A lot of travelings that I do are related to food. And one of the ones that are kind of very memorable is the one in Cambodia where a lot of their protein products in their cuisine is basically insects and things that they find locally. So I had an opportunity to try out a sort of a new, new age restaurant over there where they offered fried tarantulas. Locust, fried. And they were like sauteed worms. So it was just like, it was quite, you know, intriguing. And I tried fried locust, which was very crispy and very delicious. Having it with a little chili, because it's South Asia, you kind of have to have some aspect of it a little spicy, and that was great. And then also frog legs. I also tried frog legs. Eggs as well. And let me tell you, it does taste like chicken.

Kusha Navodar (21:42)

Oh, wow, Rayyan, thank you so much for that. Hunter, have you tried locust before?

Hunter Lewis (21:48)

I've tried locusts. I'm into the crunchy bugs.

Kusha Navodar (21:51)

We've got about. I'm looking at the clock, about a minute left if somebody wants to go on a food adventure, but they don't know how to start, they don't know where to start. Real quick, Hunter, how would you suggest they get started?

Hunter Lewis (22:03)

Pick your place first. You gotta make it. You gotta at least make one decision, but pick your place, you know, and, and I would personally start through that market, you know, figure out what, what the great markets of that place are. Go early in the morning. Make that the start of your journey. And if you're not going to do the research, at least have that one anchor spot. And I think a market is a great, great window into not just a neighborhood's food culture, but into a city's food culture because you've got all these different vendors and farmers coming from all over that area coming to that one place, and that's a great place to start.

Alison Stewart (22:41)

That was Kusha Navadar's conversation with Hunter Lewis, editor in chief of Food and Wine. Up next, Emily Weinstein, food and cooking editor for the New York Times, shares her tips for summer cooking, from dishes to help you cool off to recipes that won't have you running the stovetop or oven for too long because sometimes you can't stand the heat and but you also don't want to stay out of the kitchen. Stick around. This is all of it. Your business is one of a kind, so your website should be, too. With wix, it's easy, almost too easy to create a website that's perfectly yours. Just tell AI what kind of site you want to build or choose from thousands of templates, change whatever you want whenever you want and get everything you need to start running your business your way. No matter what you sell or what you aspire to be, you can do it all yourself on Wix. Go to wix.com I'm gonna put you on nephew.

Hunter Lewis (23:43)

All right, unc.

Callers (23:44)

Welcome to McDonald's. Can I take your order, miss?

Hunter Lewis (23:46)

I've been hitting up McDonald's for years. Now it's back. We need snack wraps. What's a snack wrap? It's the return of something great. Snack wrap is back.